What's missing in Mockingjay
by Lea Witchie Bitchie
Summary: This story fills the gap between the end of Chapter 27 and the Epilogue of Mockingjay.
1. Chapter 1

_We learn to keep busy again. Peeta bakes. I hunt. Haymitch drinks until the liquor runs out, and then raises geese until the next train arrives. Fortunately, the geese can take pretty good care of themselves. We're not alone. A few hundred others return because, whatever has happened, this is our home. With the mines closed, the plow the ashes into the earth and plant food, Machines from the Capitol break ground for a new factory where we will make medicines. Although no one seeds it, the Meadow turns green again. _

_Peeta and I grow back together. There are still moments when he clutches the back of a chair and hangs on until the flashbacks are over. I wake screaming from nightmares of mutts and lost children. But his arms are there to comfort me. And eventually his lips. On the night I feel that thing again, the hunger that overtook me on the beach, I know this would have happened anyway. That what I need to survive is not Gale's fire, kindled with rage and hatred. I have plenty of fire myself. What I need is the dandelion in the spring. The bright yellow that means rebirth instead of destruction. The promise that life can go on, no matter how bad our losses. That it can be good again. And only Peeta can give me that. _

_So after, when he whispers, "You love me. Real or not real?"_

_I tell him, "Real."_

His arms close tighter around me, and his forehead pushes gently against mine. A tear runs from my tightly closed eye down my cheek, and my lips find his. We lay there, him protectively wrapped around me, silent. It's been long since I haven't felt so secure. Probably the last time was in the cave. My thoughts begin to run down the long road of my memories. Everything flashes: the day of my father's death. The days of hunting, alone. The day Peeta saved my life – my family's life – by giving me the bread. The day I met Gale in the woods. Chasing together. Talking. Trading at the Hob. Then, the day of the reaping. Prim's name being called, my volunteering, Peeta's name, the goodbyes. The Capitol: my prep' team, Cinna. The opening ceremony. The red-haired Avox girl. The interview. Peeta's. The night before the Games, on the roof. The launching room. The Arena. The days of being alone, of thinking Peeta had betrayed me. Rue. Rue's death. The mutts. The berries. The trip back home. Victor's Village. Gale's kiss. President Snow's visit, the smell of blood and roses. The Victory Tour: District 11, Rue's family, the man who whistled, the bullet. Peeta's anger against Haymitch and me. The smell of revolution in the Districts. The nights in the train. Peeta's public proposal. Plutarch Heavensbee and his mockingjay watch. Back home, Gale being whipped. Darius on the ground. Bonnie and Twill in the woods. The District 13 revelation. The announcement of the Quarter Quell. My despair. The Capitol again; the prep team, Cinna, the mockingjay dress for the interview, the other victors: Finnick, Mags. Beetee and Wiress. Johanna. Cinna being beaten in the launching room. The Games, again. The Arena. The force field, Finnick bringing Peeta back to life. Several days. The acid fog, Mags running into it. Wiress saying "tick, tock". The revelation: the Arena is a clock. The breads. Beetee's plan, the arrow with the wire, into the force field. The Arena exploding. The aircraft. Haymitch saying they couldn't take Peeta. Despair, again. Gale saying that District 12 had been destroyed. District 13; my mother and Prim. The ashes of District 12. President Coin, my agreement to be the Mockingjay, my conditions. Finnick and his rope, making knots. Beetee's special bow. The flop of the studio propo; District 2, the visit of the hospital, the bombing. Peeta on television, calling for a cease-fire. Peeta warning them of an attack, being tortured. The alarms; the bunker, the impacts. The rebels going to save Peeta and Annie. Peeta hijacked; his hatred for me, trying to kill me. District 2 and the Nut. Johanna in the hospital. Finnick and Annie's wedding. The training to take part in the war, along with Johanna. Peeta joining their unit at the last minute. Boggs death, the Holo. The lie about a secret mission to kill Snow. The members of the unit dying, one by one, on their way to the center of the Capitol. Cressida leading them to Tigris's shop. Then, the final assault. The exploding parachutes, the death of the children around the President's mansion. The fire. Prim. Prim's death. How I couldn't help blaming Gale. The visit to President Snow, the roses. Snow's execution – the arrow in President Coin's heart. The days of nothingness, in a room. Blur. Fog. The going back to District 12 with Peeta and Haymitch after I was acquitted. The months of recovering, that still aren't over, and that never will be. And now, here I am.

Peeta caresses my wet cheek.


	2. Chapter 2

I'm sitting on the floor at the place of my old house, where they will start to rebuild something very soon. My eyes follow the gracious flight of a mockingjay that's heading to the woods. And my thoughts start to fly, too.  
>The more I think about it, the more I realize it was logical for me to be with Peeta. We've lived so much horror together it would have been impossible for either of us to live with another person. Because they wouldn't understand. All those memories we have in common, those nightmares, it's what links us together, what builds that sphere around us that no one else can enter completely. We're trapped together by horror... and love. We need each other to be whole.<br>I can't help thinking about us, since that first kiss in months, after the rebellion. I guess it keeps my mind on a track somehow. I remember the thing the doctor suggested back in Thirteen, in the hospital. To begin with the simple things. I still do it sometimes, I think it helps.  
>"My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am safe now. The Capitol has been defeated. My sister Prim died and maybe that's because of Gale. Gale works in another District. I am with Peeta now. He brings me comfort and love—" A soft voice interrupts my thoughts. "Hey." His arms enlace my waist as I turn my head to receive his kiss. He sits right behind me, his folded legs around my body.<br>"I was just thinking about you", I say. "About us."  
>He smiles gently. "I do that very often." I smile back and grab the hand that is on my stomach. The light breeze brings the smells from the woods. I close my eyes. "We could do it, you know." This sentence reminds me of something. The day of the reaping, Gale, in the woods. Saying that we could run away. My hand grips on his. "Have children." As I start he quickly adds: "They'd be safe."<br>I turn to see his face. I must look horrified because he laughs. "Katniss, this is not the Panem we grew up in. It's a new one. There are no Games anymore. Our kids would be happy... Can't you imagine them, here, running on the meadow, in the woods with you? You'd teach them how to hunt—"  
>"Peeta...", I stop him. I take some time to clear my mind of the pictures of two kids playing together in front of our house in Victor's Village. Then I say, "This is not the time." I want to be soft, I don't want to be rude with him. I've never been the good one at "saying something" though. I take a breath: "This is not the time", I repeat. "Not now. I don't want to have this conversation now." By the look on his face, I know I have to explain more. "Peeta, it has not even been a year since the rebellion, since Snow has fallen. Since... since Prim is dead". I close my eyes, trying to put some order in my thoughts. Do I want children? I don't know anymore. I remember the conversation I had with Gale two – or is it three? – years ago on this topic. I didn't want children. Because I knew I wouldn't be able to stand the idea that they could possibly get reaped. And now? It has changed, as Peeta said, everything has changed. There is no danger anymore. So what is this resistance I feel when he mentions the idea?<br>He has stood still, waiting for me to finish thinking. He always knows when I'm thinking, I don't know how. He makes the difference between when I'm thinking and when I'm just lost in the nothingness or in the maze of day nightmares. Then, he brings me back to real life, and I'm thankful for it. If he sees I'm thinking, he won't bother me.  
>"Katniss", he says in a soft voice while I turn to him. "I know it will take time. Of course it will. But you have to understand that there is no more reason to be afraid." I try a shy smile that he gives me brightly back and he adds with energy: "Hey, I'm there okay. I just want you to feel good. I need to know what's wrong if there is anything wrong. Ever."<br>"Thank you", I whisper. I lay my head against his. "I promise I'll tell you. I just have to figure it out."  
>He caresses my forehead. "Sure." His other hand retires from my stomach. "Hey, why don't you go hunting? I think you need it."<br>I smile and kiss him before I go.


	3. Chapter 3

A few weeks pass before he brings in the topic again. We're lying in our bed, it's dark, the air is really warm. A light breeze enters by the open window. He whispers: "It's Prim, right?" A picture flashes in my head. My mum after my father's death. Almost dead herself. And Prim, on the corner of the bed, looking at her, her big eyes full with tears. Peeta's hand reaches my cheek. Another picture flashes. Prim among the children around President Snow's mansion. The remaining parachutes exploding.  
>"Yes." Yes, she's the reason I don't want children. Because she's suffered. Because she was defenceless. Because she died.<p>

Another picture. The face of my mother, destroyed, after Prim's death. "Yes. Peeta, I... I..."  
>"Shhh." His comforting arms embrace me and his forehead presses against the top of my back. "I know what you feel." And I believe him. Because I know that he knows. He knows me so well he can understand a feeling he's never had just by thinking like me, exchanging two words with me, touching me, or just watching me. So I say nothing more and let the tears break out.<p>

For a while, he just caresses my cheek and I feel his chest raise and lower against my back. I realize I feel secure. I realize how lucky I am despite the bad luck I'm in since my father's death – maybe it was even bad luck for me to be born. Yes, I'm lucky to have him… Peeta, the boy with the bread. Without who I'd be dead several times and undoubtedly crazy. And I'm unable to thank him the way I should; I feel guilty and weak. I know a child is the only real way. And I don't want to. Who am I? Am I really this selfish monster people used to see me as?

"Katniss", he calls in a soft, almost broken voice. "You need some time, I know that. And we're young." Yes, we're young… but we're so old in our hearts. We've witnessed so much pain, suffering and death, and we've suffered too much. "I'm not asking for a child right now, you know. I just want you to understand that this child deserves to live, and that it's okay to want him, or her. I want you to accept the fact that you would be a good mother. Not underestimate you, for once. Katniss, look at me." Slowly, I turn to him and look at him in the eye. "Can you understand that? That our child would not have to suffer like we did, or like Prim did?" After a silence, I nod. "Hey, I want you to want this child, okay", he adds with a thin smile as tear escapes his eye.

"Yes", I whisper. I grab his hand and draw things on it for a while. Then I push the words out: "I know how much it matters to you… I want to do it, for you. I'll want this child, I promise. I just need some time."

He draws me closer to him and plants a gentle kiss on my slightly open lips. I grab his shoulders and kiss him back, transforming the gentle kiss into a wilder one. We move in such a way that when we separate, I'm sitting on top of him. There's that irresistible smile on his lips. "Katniss…"

"What?" I say, almost defiantly.

"I want you."


	4. Chapter 4

In my life, I have spent an uncountable amount of nights stuck to Peeta, embraced in such a way that he was everywhere around me and I was everywhere around him. There was also a lot of kissing, false and then honest. But I don't think I had ever considered taking the further step. Probably because I didn't have time to think about it, with the Games and then the war going on. I'm not saying I didn't ever feel any desire for him. I did. But I just pushed it aside, because my personal pleasure had no place in the life I was living.

I'm afraid. I guess it's natural to be. I have no idea what I should do, I'm afraid to seem ridiculous, or not to be good enough. I know it's the logical follow-up and that everybody does it, and I feel desire for him. But I'm afraid.

We're at the District's drugstore, buying the pills that will keep me from becoming pregnant. He keeps telling me that we can wait if I don't want to do it tonight. I keep telling him that it's okay. I smile, and he smiles back.

On our way back we drop by the place of my old home. They're building walls. I stand there, looking at my old home becoming a new one. Probably it will be bigger. I wonder who will live in it. I shake my head to chase the image of Prim, so cute in her reaping clothes. Prim walking towards the stage where Effie Trinket stands.

Peeta is behind me, he grabs my shoulders. "Katniss."

I don't turn to him when I say: "I'm going to hunt."

He lets go, and I know that he nods. "Yes, you need it. See you later."

I head toward the woods. They made a door in the fence. I open it, and suddenly, it's another world.

Suddenly, I'm young, I'm alone, and I must feed the family. Danger. I can feel it. Adrenaline rushes through my veins. I grab the hidden bow and the set of arrows, and that's me against the wild, me against death. I must fight, kill, and hide. Yes, my Hunger Games had begun long before I volunteered. I cross the woods, killing animals and stuffing them in my game bag; I am not human anymore. I am something more, or something less. Probably both. I am the predator.

When I get home, there's the smell of something freshly baked. I make it to the kitchen, where a cake lays on the table. It's green, my favourite green, and orange, like sunset. It's the woods and the sky. Truly beautiful. On it, there's something written. "Real."

I sigh, and a smile appears on my lips.

"Hey, beauty", says a voice behind me. I turn to him. "Hmm, muddy beauty." He bursts out laughing. A mirror makes me realize how dirty I am, indeed. In front of me, there's a wild girl, a free girl, covered in mud, with her game bag full of squirrels and rabbits. Her eyes are tired, but vivacious, they reflect attention and readiness. I know this girl; for the first time in months, in years maybe, I fully recognise myself. And it feels good.

I wash myself, change clothes and go to the living room. Peeta is sitting on the sofa, cutting the cake. I join him. He offers me a slice, I take a bite in it. "Mmmh, Peeta, it's so good." He smiles at me. I take one bite more, then can't stand it anymore: I put my slice back on the table, do the same with his, push him back, lean on him and kiss him.

It is soft and hard, peaceful and wild, there is pleasure and pain, contradictory feelings linked together, allied, mixed together to make such an immense explosion of sensations, and I would like to freeze this moment and live in it forever, because I can't think of anything else than the moment, the absolute present, I can't see anything else than us, our bodies making up a whole. The world is reduced to us, only us, just us. And there is no measure to how good it feels.


	5. Chapter 5

It brings a whole new dimension to our relationship. The dimension of desire and of pleasure. It doesn't change anything to what we had before; it just adds something. And it feels great.

Life goes on. Months and seasons go by. Just as usual, I hunt, Peeta bakes, and Haymitch gets drunk. He sometimes comes at our house, we talk when he's not too wasted, we sing when he is. One day, when Peeta's not at home, he comes and I realize that he doesn't smell like alcohol at all.

"Hey, sweetheart", he says with his usual smile.

"Hey, Haymitch. How's life when it's sober?"

He looks around and sits on a kitchen chair. "Steady."

We laugh. I ask him: "Here to talk about something in particular?"

He doesn't answer immediately. He just keeps looking around, and then he stares at me. "I don't know. I was just wondering... You know... You're nearly twenty and you have nothing to do with your life—"

"That's not true!" I tell him. But deep inside, I know that's sort of true. All I do is hunt, complete the book, eat, spend time with Peeta. I've never wanted to get a job, a real one, because none of them appeals me. And I don't need any money.

He continues: "Well, yes, it's true, and so I was wondering, have you and Peeta ever thought about—"

"Haymitch", I stop him, guessing what comes next.

"What?" he says, his eyebrows arched. "What's wrong about having children, now that there's no more Hunger Games?"

"Peeta and I have talked about that. I'm not ready", I say. "And anyway why am I talking about this with you?", I cry, suddenly standing up.

"Wow, wow, calm down, Girl on Fire.", he says, making a pacifying gesture with his hands, a smile in the corner of his lips. Then he lowers his head, as though he was about to confess a weakness. "I just... If you had children, they'd be... they'd be like grandchildren to me. And I'd like it."

I'm taken aback. Haymitch as a grandfather? I have always seen Haymitch as my mentor, even as an useless individual at the beginning, not more than a mentor, not as… a part of my family. But yeah, now that I think about it, during the last years, Haymitch has been the closest to a father figure to me – he's so not alike my own father, of course, but yes, he was a little bit like a father –, keeping me alive, guiding me – not leading me –, helping me figure out who I am, just the way a father should. So Haymitch, as the grandfather to my children, to our children? Probably that's the way it would be.

"Yeah... Yeah, I guess you're right...", I say in a dreamy voice.

"Always am", he replies, raising his chin, in a false proud voice. We laugh again.

"But still, I'm not ready", I say, serious again. As he stays silent, I add: "And you, Haymitch. If you had someone, would you want children?"

"Nah. Not me. I'm not even sure I could give up alcohol, and even if I could, I'd look so miserable to them. I'm old, Katniss. My children would be ashamed of me. I wouldn't stand that."

"To me you're not miserable", I say, smiling to him. "Just... wasted."

We burst out laughing, and that's when Peeta comes home. He's glad to find us in such a hilarity and asks for the reason, and Haymitch answers: "Oh, Katniss and I were just talking about your future children. How I'd be happy to act as their grandfather." He gives me a falsely exasperated look. "But she's _not ready_".

Peeta smiles to both of us. "Haymitch, we'll be happy to have you as a grandfather to them… when the time comes. It's Katniss who will decide when she's ready. Until then, go get a drink, you're way too sentimental when you're sober", he laughs.

Haymitch stands up and turns to me: "You, come here." I obey and he embraces both Peeta and me. "Remember my one and only advice, 'stay alive'?" We nod. Of course we do… "Well, I'm happy you took it. Happy you're still here with me… thank you." His voice almost breaks on the last two words.

I feel a tear about to break free. "No, thank _you_, Haymitch, for keeping us alive."

Peeta embraces us stronger. "Yes. And thank you two for still being with me."


	6. Chapter 6

Months and years go by. I have finally accepted to be the music teacher at the District's school. I begin to enjoy my job, particularly when I realize that the kids really enjoy my lessons. Peeta has opened a bakery where he sells his bread and cakes. I still hunt, when I'm not at school. Haymitch makes efforts to drink less. I suspect that he trains for when we'll have children, to prove himself that he can do it. I'm touched by his efforts, and I feel the resistance to the idea of having children weakening slowly.

It's the end of the Summer. I decide to take my young students, new ones, to the Meadow, to teach them the Meadow Song. After the Games, the rebellion, Prim's death, I hadn't been able to sing this song for one year or two. Because it reminded me of Rue's death, of the desperation that comes with the loss of a loved one. It reminded me of my father, of Prim. Now, years after, I feel that I am strong enough to sing it, and to teach it. And they love it. Some already know it, because it's been a part of the traditions of District 12 since a long, long time and the families still sing it sometimes. And I feel happy, singing along with the kids in the sun. Singing on this peaceful graveyard.

_Deep in the meadow, under the willow_

_A bed of grass, a soft green pillow..._

_Lay down your head, and close your eyes_

_And when they open, the sun will rise..._

I let them go home. Then, as usual, I go hunting. The jacket, the bow, the arrows, they're safely waiting for me. I grab them and transform into the Katniss I like the most, Katniss the hunter. Because that Katniss knows what she's doing. She feels secure. She feels strong.

I shoot a squirrel, thinking I'm gonna cook it for Peeta tonight. Right in the eye like always. I take the arrow, stuff the animal into my game bag, and move deeper in the woods. I'm not sure I've ever been there. After a while, I see one of those big, fat birds that Gale and I used to hunt, I had not seen one in a long time. It's perched on a branch not far from me, apparently looking at me, a mocking look that seems to say, "Go on. Shoot." And I shoot.

The bird falls on the ground.

It all happens so fast: the explosion, the blast, the clusters, I'm hurled backwards with an incredible violence, I land harshly on the ground, my head hits a tree, I feel clusters of wood in my body, my vision is troubled by blood. For a while, I can't breathe; the blood falls in my open mouth. I'm gasping for air; when it finally comes, it hurts like fire in my throat. I know I have to go back to the fence. I know I can't stay here. I know I mustn't try to understand now. I try to stand up, but my legs are numb and slow and I fall several times before I succeed. I use the tree as support; everything around me is spinning. I try to walk and have to lean against the next tree to avoid falling again. I whip the blood from my forehead and discover I'm bleeding from the back of the head too. I try to look at my legs but my neck and my head hurt too much. I bring my left arm in front of my eyes: it's all covered in blood, and a wood cluster has broken through the jacket and is probably stuck in my forearm, I don't know, the pain comes from my whole body.

I make some more steps, with huge efforts not to fall. I have to make it. I have to get to the fence. I have to.

My legs don't obey anymore. I fall on the ground.


	7. Chapter 7

Voices. Voices in a blur. Regular beeps. I try to open my eyes. They're so heavy. I can't. I can't feel my body.

What happened? I remember the bird. "Go on. Shoot."

A voice I know. Peeta. I try harder to open my eyes and finally manage to open them in a slit. I see a human shape rushing at me and I feel a warm body embracing me. "Katniss! You're awake."

Another voice, a deep one. "Mr. Mellark, be careful. She's weak."

"Yes, doctor", I hear Peeta say. I open my eyes almost entirely and see him sitting on the side of my hospital bed. I recognize the hospital. My hand reaches Peeta's arm. He takes it, brings it to his lips and kisses it. "Oh, Katniss… You've frightened me so much."

"What happened?" I manage to get out of my mouth.

"I'll explain her", says the doctor. Peeta nods. "So, miss Everdeen… You've been in a coma for three months now." Shock. Three months? How… "You were blown by a mine, in the woods. Do you remember?" He stops. I'm too busy swallowing the information. "Miss Everdeen, do you remember?" he repeats.

"Yes."

"Good. And do you remember how it happened?"

"Yes. A bird on a tree. I shot it. It fell on the ground. The explosion."

"Ah, I see. You can be thankful towards this bird, miss Everdeen, because it triggered the mine instead of you. If you had walked on it, you'd have died in less than a second." He pauses. Peeta looks at me, looking both really worried at the thought and happy to see me there, alive, awake. "Well, after that, you tried to return to the District, I guess, because we didn't find you at the place where the mine exploded, but a little further in the direction of the District." I nod. "You had lost too much blood, of course, to go any further. You passed out and the inhabitants, who had heard the explosion, found you there, lying on the ground. They brought you to the hospital right in time for us to keep you alive… But we couldn't do more than maintain you in a coma. I must say we were surprised that you even survived, and that we didn't have many hopes about your waking up. But here you are", he smiles. "The Security Services were immediately called, and it was established that there were a few mines, left there by the Capitol during the last rebellion. Actually", he looks at me right in the eye, "you were lucky not to encounter one of those before." Peeta's hand closes tighter around mine.

"The mines, they're still there?" I ask in a weak voice.

"No, the woods are entirely clear now. A special team from District 3 cleared the zone – or should I say, the whole country. I can assure you that there is not one mine left in Panem right now." I nod. "So here's the whole story… Now I'm going to let you two alone. But, Mr. Mellark, not more than 30 minutes. She needs to sleep."

"Like you haven't done that for three months", Peeta says. He smiles, and I notice his smile is not the same as before. It's less brilliant, less powerful. It's weaker. It's a smile that carries three months of pain and loneliness and suffering. And I know it's my job to give him back his old smile.

"Hey…" I say. "I'm sorry… I should have been more careful…"

"How could you know? Nobody knew about the mines. You don't have to be sorry, okay. Anyway, you're there now, and you're going to be fine in a week. It's all that matters. I'm so happy that you're awake."

I try to sit down to kiss him, but I'm too weak and my body doesn't obey. "Shhht. Don't move", he says as he leans on me and kisses me.

It's good… I don't want to let go. And it seems I'll never have to, until…

"Hey, sweetheart", says a voice coming from the door.

Peeta sits up and I try to look at my ex-Mentor, who's trying to get to my bed with unuseful zigzags. "Oops. Sorry I'm disturbing you two…"

"You're not disturbing", I say with a slight smile.

"They told me you were a… awake. Wanted to say hello. Missed you, sweetheart… Thought you were never gonna wake up… And him", he says pointing in the general direction of Peeta, "imagine him, alone with an old man like me, how could you do… do that to him?" Peeta and I laugh. He smiles too. "But I… I promise I'll get sober again soon." He looks ashamed. "Started drinkin' again 'cuz of you… your accident."

"I'm glad to see you again, Haymitch."

He smiles again. "Yeah me too. But ya need to be alone… Star-crossed lovers."


	8. Chapter 8

_Dear readers, as I keep to Suzanne Collins' 9-Chapters "rule", this is the next to last chapter. I'd like to thank all of you for reading! Your favoritings, adding to story alerts, and reviews mean a lot to me, thank you for those too! Keep sharing my fanfic, and follow me on Twitter ThatKatniss, I follow back :) _

My name is Katniss Everdeen. I was blown by a mine 3 months ago. I fell into a coma. I nearly died. The Games and the War are over but none of us is invulnerable. I realized how precious life is. Peeta loves me. I love him back. Life will go on.

Slowly, I heal, under the care of District 12's doctors and the love of Peeta. Slowly, Haymitch gets sober again. Slowly, life goes on.  
>I can go back home two weeks after my waking up. Peeta and I start living a couple's life again, and we're in a hurry to make up for lost time. For days, we don't go out of our home and everybody leaves us alone. Our mutual love is as fresh as in the beginning, as fresh as young love. We've realized that we're not invulnerable nor immortal, and that life can stop at every moment.<p>

And one day, Peeta brings in this one topic again. "Katniss... While you were in a coma, I was so desperate... actually I was doubly desperate." My eyes ask for an explanation. He gives it: "First, because you weren't there anymore, and showed no sign of getting better... And second..." He lowers his head and voice at the same time. "Because if you died, if you didn't wake up, there wouldn't be any living proof of your visit on the Earth."  
>Children. The word comes immediately; but this time, I don't feel any resistance. Because this time, in my mind, it isn't connected to suffering or danger anymore. This time it means life, it means a product of love, a proof of our love and our lives.<br>And I feel a sudden urge to thank him, for everything. For making me understand that. For loving me. For having been there with me, in my mind or beside me, since the day he threw me the bread to today, with only painful breaks. For being forever the Boy with the Bread. Mine.

And I know there are three words that can make him understand all that. "I love you", I just say. He kisses me gently and wraps his arms protectively around me. For a while, we don't move nor speak. I think about our future children. I see them playing together, one boy and one girl, yes, I'd like to have one boy and one girl. I begin to get used to the idea.

So when he breaks the silence and asks: "You want them. Real or not real?"  
>I tell him: "Real."<p> 


	9. Chapter 9

I stop taking the pills. We don't know when it would be right to make love to have a baby, and we don't want to know. We don't need to. We just do as usual, knowing that, one day, it will work. One day, the product of our love will be conceived.

It's late morning when there are knocks on the door. And when I open it, it's not only the bright sunlight that takes be aback.

I stare at her. It the only thing I seem to be able to do. I stare at her old, weak eyes and smile, the lips thinner than I remember. Her blonde hair have turned gray. The faint smile doesn't disappear entirely when the silent tears start running down her sunken cheeks. And when I take her in my arms, I am crying, too.

"Katniss", she sobs.

I do nothing to keep the words from escaping my mouth. "I missed you."

It's true, I have. But I missed her like you miss a dead person. A part of my brain kept ranking her amongst the dead. For a part of my brain, my mother died when Prim did. If someone asked me "Your mother is dead, real or not real?", I would probably have said "Real" with no further hesitation. And now, I'm convinced my brain did that to keep me healthy. Because that's the way it hurts less to miss someone.

Feeling her body in my arms is surprisingly relieving.

Peeta bakes a bread of the kind that he threw to me, that rainy, starving day that seems a hundred years ago. The bread that saved me and my family. He even burns it slightly. My mother recognizes it.

We talk a lot. About everything that has happened during the last fifteen years. Yes, the rebellion was 15 years ago… She worked in almost all of Panem's hospitals after the rebellion, trying not to stay at a place for more than a year, because it brought routine and memories. What she didn't want. Now, she had retired.

When Peeta announces her that we're planning on having children, she cries again. She tells us that it will be wonderful, that she'll be there for us if we need her. I thank her. I ask her if she'll live in our house here in Victors Village, that is empty since I moved to Peeta's. She says that she has to think about it. I can see the memories overwhelming her, her happy expression turning in a weak one. I know that face, from a long, long time ago. And I know she'll never be strong, no matter the time that passes.

Later she'll buy a house near the center of the town, not far from Peeta's bakery.

We've told Haymitch, too, about our now-common desire to have children. He struggles with his bugbear, and the guy that sells liquor makes jokes saying that he'll go bankrupt soon. I'm proud of my Mentor, because he proved, to himself and to us, that with a strong will, he can excel himself. You can win in an arena, survive the wildest dangers; that doesn't mean you won't lose against your own self. Because, often, you don't have to look too far to find your worst enemy. Often, it's you.

⁂

"Katniss Everdeen  
>Do I really need to tell you<br>Who she is and where she lives?"

That's what's written on the envelope that arrives by the mail one morning. I don't recognize the writing. But I know, immediately, that, amongst the living people I know, only one can be behind this.

"Hey, Catnip.

I won't write anything about how long it has been since we last saw each other and in which regrettable circumstances it was, because it would be pointless. We both know all that. And I hope, with the time, you have been able to heal. I know you did, actually. You're so strong.

I have gotten in touch with your mother recently, for business reasons… and others. I wanted to know what you were up to. She told me about the accident, the mines… And she told me that Peeta and you would surely be parents soon.

It's wonderful, and I'm sincere. It's been long since I made the mistake to delay you in the quest of your real love. Now, it's behind me, behind us, and I want you not to worry about me. I'm great, really. If you want more details about my life just ask your mother, she'll probably know."

There is no signature. A smile begins to spread on my lips. Yes, I've healed. And I've forgiven him. Forgiven him for something that he didn't do.

That's when I feel it. The little twist in my lower abdomen. "Peeta", I whisper. And already his arms are around my waist, his hands on the temporary home of our future child. 

* * *

><p><em>Now, it's time to open Mockingjay on page 454 and keep reading…<br>Now, I'm telling you goodbye.  
>Thank you again for loafing my fanfic so much.<em>

_Don't forget to follow me on Twitter (ThatKatniss)._

_I loaf you all.  
><em>


	10. Questions to my readers

Dear readers,

I've got some questions to ask you : If I wrote another fanfic, would you read it ? And I wrote a Harry Potter-related fanfic ?

I would be happy to hear your suggestions about a new fanfic.

Thank you so much 3


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